Dear Edwards Church Community,
Symbols have power. They hold meaning, and meaning moves us, holds us together or pulls us apart. Take the current dust up regarding Colin Kaepernick, a back-up quarterback for the San Francisco 49ers who has been taking a knee during the national anthem. His decision – at first to sit and then to kneel on one knee as a sign of respect for armed service members, while most others in the stadium stand and face the flag with hats removed and hands on hearts – has sparked a controversy.
As an NFL quarterback, Kaepernick is a public figure. As a black man, he has his own perspective on race in America. As a professional athlete who is regularly on TV and who has access to the media, he says that his decision not to stand is not about himself as much as it is about those with no voice and no access to the media.
I am old enough to remember the 1968 Olympic Games, when gold medalist Tommie Smith and bronze medalist John Carlos, two black American men, stood on the medals platform with raised fists. They paid a price, as have other African Americans like Mohammed Ali, who used their fame to draw attention to systemic racism. These are not empty gestures. Social and financial pressures are brought to bear. Ali gave up his title and the ability to fight for a time. Tommie Smith and John Carlos had trouble getting work after their protest.
As important as their voices are (and we need to hear them), there are other perspectives, which reflect cross-currents in our culture. On August 31, Keith Woods, Vice President for Diversity in News and Operations at NPR, offered an audio salute to his father, a WWII veteran, titled “My Father Stood For The Anthem, For The Same Reason That Colin Kaepernick Sits”. Growing up in the 1960’s in New Orleans, Wood writes, “I found my father’s love of country utterly bewildering. His was the generation of men born free but shackled by bigotry. Yet every time he took my brothers and me to see the Saints play football at old Tulane Stadium, we all stood for the national anthem.”
After chronicling his father’s post-war successes and how they were limited by institutional racism, Woods describes how he internalized his father’s respect for the flag so thoroughly that “I stand even before the first strains of the [national anthem] begin, but what rises in my chest is less my own expression of patriotism and more an artifact of the pride my father was forced to wrench from the stingy grip of his country. … And what could you truly make of me just a week ago, when that beautiful music started and I rose to my feet at a Washington Nationals baseball game. If what you saw was an unmitigated display of patriotism, you were wrong. My relationship to my flawed homeland is too complicated for that.”
Most people would rather not talk about racism, especially white folks who are buffered from its negative effects. It’s an inherently uncomfortable topic. But it still lives. No one would argue that every officer involved shooting of a person of color is racially motivated. But I also believe that no one who follows the news and is honest with themselves could argue that none of them involve racism. Between those rhetorical poles, we need a lot of conversation.
Matt Ufford, a Marine veteran of the Iraq war and a regular contributor to the sports web site SBNation.com, filed a video commentary titled “Focus on Kaepernick’s message and not his method.” It reminds me why I have so much respect for all officers commissioned in our military, who swear an oath to defend the Constitution. Ufford respects the flag, but even more so he respects the freedom of expression and the government accountable to the governed for which it stands. Symbols have power.
Ufford closes his comments with this question: “Think about the last time you got pulled over by the cops. What was the first thing that flashed through your mind? Was it how can I get out of this ticket? Where is my insurance card? … Or did you think, ‘What do I need to do so I don’t get shot?’”
I value the police and their service. I believe the overwhelming majority are good people doing a good job for the right reasons. But we all live in a culture that still struggles with race. Not acknowledging that is refusing to deal with it.
May we keep seeking ways, in church and in our daily lives, to connect with all our neighbors, so that we can all stand and be pulled together, and not apart.
Blessings,
Michael